Consumers Can Pull The Plug On Telephone Sales

June 30, 1985|By Jim Talley, Business Writer

The next time a good meal, hot shower or a romantic evening is interrupted by an unsolicited telephone sales call, don`t just get angry -- get off the list.

For the past 14 years, the New York-based Direct Marketing Association has sponsored a vehicle of change for people who would rather not have their mailboxes stuffed with the many unwanted commercial circulars and assorted offerings often called junk mail. Now the DMA has established a sister service to help eliminate junk calls.

``We take the names of people who contact us, put it on a computer tape and circulate it quarterly`` among corporate subscribers, said DMA spokesman Roberta Wexler. ``It is largely effective because nobody wants to waste money on unresponsive customers.

``Anything that can be done to get to the right person is worth its weight in phone calls,`` Wexler observes.

As a result of this, and because many people`s busy lives make telephone ordering convenient, more and more companies -- from brokerage companies selling individual retirement accounts to insurance companies and record and book clubs -- are making their initial inquiries over the phone.

``Many magazines, like Time Inc., have been doing it forever to renew subscriptions`` and possibly gain new ones, Wexler said.

But she added that many organizations don`t want to antagonize people who may become customers in the future, so they are willing to pay about $200 to subscribe to the DMA`s quarterly ``delete`` lists.

In an information-oriented society, virtually everyone is on some list or another, and businesses tap a variety of outlets to dig up potential customers.

One of the best, of course, is the telephone book. But retailers, for example, often target new residents by checking on municipal utility deposits. Other companies use public records to find the names and addresses of those who own homes, cars, boats and other things, as well as to gather information on marriages, births, deaths and divorces.

Magazine readers are on subscription lists, while college graduates can be found in alumni directories. And professionals such as doctors, lawyers, engineers and teachers can often be located through licensing lists or the membership rosters of one or more professional associations to which they may belong.

Some outfits, such as Sears, Roebuck & Co., keep their lists to themselves, Wexler said. Others, like L.L. Bean Inc. -- the Freeport, Maine- based mail order firm that specializes in camping gear and other products for those who like to rough it -- ask customers to send in the mailing label from their latest catalog if they don`t want their names made available to other companies.

But many other organizations rent their customer lists to firms seeking to scout out new prospects. And as dismaying as this may be to some, many people seemingly don`t object.

Since 1971, when DMA established its Mail Preference Service, 491,000 consumers nationwide -- or only about 35,000 a year -- have signed up to stem the flow of unwanted mail. And despite wide publicity in the six months since the DMA set up its Telephone Preference Service, only 13,788 people across the nation -- or about 2,300 a month -- have participated.

Wexler terms the response ``modest,`` especially since advertisements on both the mail and telephone service have appeared in such widely read publications as Consumer Reports, Good Housekeeping, Time magazine and U.S. News & World Report.

She adds that by a ratio of 2 1/2 to 1, more people have asked to be added to the DMA`s listings to receive catalogs, sweepstakes offers and magazine solicitations than have asked to have their names removed.

Junk mail -- and junk phone calls -- ``may not be the problem a few people think it is -- or maybe they`re just not annoyed enough to respond,`` Wexler said.

Those who want to get off the lists can do so at no charge. They should send their name, address and telephone number so a computer search can be conducted through the lists maintained by the DMA`s more than 2,500 member companies.

Many of the DMA`s member-firms conduct business in the United States and as many as 37 other countries.

Don`t, however, expect immediate results. It could take a few months before there is a noticeable decline in the number of junk telephone calls or in the amount of unwanted mail, the DMA says. And both the telephone and mail services cannot eliminate everything, since local marketers do not participate in national name-removal programs.